Hey there! I've been a bit busy the past few weeks, first getting the kid off to college and settled in his apartment (done!), then coming home and cleaning up the wreckage of said move (done!)

With those two big things done, we're officially empty nesters (aside from the dog). It's the perfect time to work on refining habits and that's what I'm doing this week. 

First off, my lunchtime workouts were NOT happening, and wearing workout clothes all day doesn't count, so this week it's roll out of bed and into the gym. I downloaded Jamie Eason's LiveFit app on my phone, and this time I downloaded the right app. I tried it a year or so ago but I had downloaded the more elaborate BodySpace social fitness app, which made following her program too complicated. This time I downloaded only her program and it's a lot easier to follow. 

Here's a video intro to the first week:

 I had bought an intro package to some kickboxing classes, but to be completely honest, I'm just not ready for it yet. After a couple hourlong classes, I found that my shoulders were really hurting and various parts of my feet are not happy (I wasn't exactly kicking the bag properly).

But more importantly, the whole day after the class I was ravenously hungry, like bottomless pit hungry, so I switched to Jamie's program because I find that I'm not a hungry grizzly bear if I focus on weight training.

And I really missed the gym! Fortunately, the one we've been members of since 1999 recently went through a huge and much needed remodel, so I dropped my secondary membership to Planet Fitness. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE Planet Fitness, but with the kid away at college, I'm not getting my value out of the Black Card membership, and we have a kid going to college, so I'm looking for ways to cut down on costs. (Our main gym has a crazy cheap yearly renewal.)

Food wise I'm still doing Weight Watchers and leaning on fruit and vegetables for the bulk of my meals and snacks. I used to plan my meals around the protein but now the vegetable is the centerpiece. By putting produce front and center I'm taking in more food for fewer Smartpoints.

Wait a minute, I'm burying the lede!

I had skipped last week's Weight Watchers meeting because I had a dental cleaning, but I had a feeling it was going to be good news today because:

1. I've been working out more
2. I've been going to sleep earlier, so ...
3. eating less late at night.

So I step on the scale Wednesday morning and BOOM! 5 pounds down, which is HUGE for me. I've also been replacing my evening snack with a bottle of kombucha. I've really grown to love the stuff and it's only 50 or so calories for the whole thing, plus I think it does good things for gut health. Whatever's on sale is what I buy. So far, I'm loving all the flavors from Humm, Kevita and Big Easy 'Bucha.

So what I call Operation #shittogether is coming together very nicely in my first week!

So what's in my gym bag?

First of all, I have a new gym bag! I covet gym bags the way some people love Pradas. I've got big ones, small ones, gray, purple, pink, blue -- a gym bag for every occasion. My newest bag is the Infinity bag from Go Dash Dot. The bag was designed with the input of more than 100 women to make sure every square inch of it is useful. It's large without being too bulky, has a load of zippered compartments decorated with cool tassels, a padded laptop area, a shoe compartment that doubles as a yoga mat holder, a very cool, stylish strap and a great smaller inner bag you can use as a cross-body bag, so your purse and gym bag fit into one neat duo. So not only is it a premium gym bag, it's also a work tote, a diaper bag, and a crossbody bag.Inside that bag is my Bandi belt. I have a few of them but recently I got a large size to comfortably stash my phone so I can follow my workout program. There are a load of similar belts on the market, and I've tried many, but I always come back to Bandi belts because they're cute and they have a latch so you don't have to crawl in and out of it.

In my Bandi, along with my phone, is a pair of Sol Republic Relays Sport wireless headphones. I had gotten them a few years ago on Kickstarter, then there were production problems with them and they stopped selling them. Now, it appears, they're selling them again, and they cost even less than they did on Kickstarter.  I've had a few pairs of Bluetooth headphones and these are my favorites. They seem to keep a charge awhile, they're super lightweight, charge quickly and they sound great. 

Because I don't want to pay $3 for a snack at the gym if I find myself in need of something, I usually stash a non-melty protein bar in there. Quest bars have their moments, but often there's too much sweeteners in them and just taste overwhelming, but I was sent a variety of Mauer Sports Nutrition protein bars. Each bar is around 200 calories and around 20 grams of protein (dairy, pea and nut blend), so one and a coffee makes a quick on-the-go breakfast, and half a bar is a decent snack. There are no artificial sweeteners or flavors, they're not cloying at all, there's a great selection of flavors (I am partial to the chocolate chip cookie dough), and many of them are uncoated so they won't melt in the heat. 

And bonus! If you use the code Gail20, you'll get a 20 percent discount on your order of bars.

And because I edit and write for the Fit Bottomed World of blogs, I have a ridiculous collection of athletic shoes. One of my jobs is to schedule social media on posts, so I read pretty much every post on every site, old and new. And because of that, I find myself playing "Target Lady" and dashing off to order things when I read reviews. One recent purchase was these Brooks Neuro shoes. Since the post is a year or so old and Brooks has already released a Neuro 2, I was able to score a great deal on them. They're super cool looking, and the cushioning on the soles is great.

My mom is downsizing to a condo, so she's having to go through 40 years of house stuff. She came over Saturday with some crumbly bits of newspaper clippings that used to be my grandmother's wedding announcement, and after we attempted to piece it together we got to talking about clutter.

My sister and I are very different when it comes tidyness. I tend to be kind of obsessive about it and she's, well, not. My mom's in the middle.

I honestly don't know how I became so fanatical about clutter but I think it had to do with my mom flinging my astronaut watch up the stairs and it breaking when it landed against a wall. I think at that young age I swore no one would ever complain about me leaving a mess anywhere.

(The "Easter egg incident" with my sister could also have been another seminal moment. My sister had a lovely decorated Easter egg that she squirreled away in a dresser drawer. Did I mention it was a real hard-boiled egg? After a week or so they don't smell too good.)

I even decluttered my blog last week!

Anyhizzle...

I'm not 24/7 super tidy, but over the years two things have really helped reboot my decluttering. One was FlyLady's daily emails. Way back when I signed up for those, FlyLady was just a Yahoo discussion group. She now has a website, an app, books, journals, a YouTube channel and a bunch more stuff. Check out her website and sign up for the emails. They give you a simple plan of action every day so that you can tackle one house zone at a time.

Another tool in my declutter box are the resources from Peter Walsh. I first read Does This Clutter Make My Butt Look Fat? and it really resonated with me. In it he refers to clutter as "the fat in our homes." (Conversely, FlyLady (Marla Cilley) wrote a book called Body Clutter, which addresses the flip side of that.) Check out Peter's website for his books, videos and newsletter.

I also subscribe to the Houzz newsletter, which I first signed up for when I was in search of kitchen remodeling inspiration. I still love our new kitchen, which celebrated its first birthday this summer, but Houzz is still fun for interior design eye candy and great articles like the one on decluttering, below.

I tried something different this past week: I wanted to see just how many of those weekly bonus Smartpoints I could use throughout the week and still show a loss on the scale. I probably should have added a few, but, no, I used every last bonus Point.

Aaaaand, I gained half a pound, stopping my weight-loss streak at four weeks.

So live and learn, right? 

While I was momentarily bummed, I now know that I should simply focus on my daily Smartpoints allowance and treat those extra Points as something I can dip into perhaps a couple times a week. 

I'm also on the tail end of a sinus infection, so that curtailed my workouts. When I get sinus infections they manifest themselves in a huge nosebleed, and I didn't want to open the floodgates while working out. 

So that's my week in weight loss. But here are some foodie highlights:

• Ever try shishito peppers? I love them, but they can be hard to find. I get mine at Trader Joe's, and they were restocked so I picked up a couple bags. Usually I roast them quickly in the oven, but I wanted to see how they'd do in the air fryer. They were fantastic. I air-fried them at 380 degrees for around 10 minutes with just a spritz of oil and a sprinkle of salt. Then you just hold 'em by the stem and eat 'em up, yum!

• I have serious "meal prep" envy, but I've come to the conclusion that the weekly prep fest just isn't for me. I don't want to "assemble" meals all week long -- I actually enjoy cooking every night. So instead of meal prep, I'm simply planning out dinners for the week, writing them down in my planner. I'll also throw in some preplanned lunches and breakfasts, but I usually have a solid handle on those.
• Speaking of breakfasts, I tried Fit Men Cook's Cottage Cheese Pancakes and they're super good. I topped them with a half-cup container of unsweetened applesauce and a bunch of cinnamon. The recipe makes two servings, and they reheat really well.  

Hard to believe this song, one of my all-time favorites, is 30 years old. Seems like it could have been written, oh, 6 months ago.